Re: [-empyre-] following

[Danny Butt <db@dannybutt.net>]

On 13/03/2007, at 5:05 PM, Henry Warwick wrote:
> What I liked especially about him was his abilities with analogies  
> and his
> imaginative ways of rethinking the obvious. Not that he was  
> necessarily
> correct, but that his ideas and connecxions could be interesting.

It seems to me that in Henry's account (which I am largely in  
agreement with in the part above) lies the appeal of JB to artists.   
I think it was in an interview with Mike Gane that Baudrillard noted  
that the fine arts community gave him the most support, even though  
they "misunderstood" him. Like any artist, though, Baudrillard always  
seemed to me to avoid being understood, he didn't want the  
responsibility that might lie in a practice based on understanding,  
and he embraced the provocateur role.

The most interesting aspect of the wake for me has been having to  
reflect on the appeal of Baudrillard to a number of my art and design  
students when I was in a teaching role. Perhaps one of the things a  
reconsideration of his work can give us is a sense of the different  
type of work that theory does in different domains - reading for  
pleasure, reading for change, reading for political strategy, reading  
for aesthetic stimulation, etc...

I guess I've always found artists and provocateurs more interesting  
when they're acting with accountability to existing social/political  
movements, rather than as lone ranger types. That's my materialist  
training and bias, the cui bono question. It's not quite the right  
question to ask of the aesthete (though I think it is the right  
question to ask of the aesthetic). So the conversation never worked  
for me. And it never seemed to work for the people I see as mentors,  
either.  And he was so hostile to the movements that shaped my  
politics that it just meant I could never feel inspired to find the  
inspiration he provided for others - my loss I guess!

Danny
--
http://www.dannybutt.net